ODNR officials filed an affidavit Friday asking that 11th District Court of Appeals Judge Diane V. Grendell be disqualified from ruling on whether private property to the water's edge can be taken without the state paying the landowners fair compensation.

According to the affidavit, the judge may not be able to be impartial because her husband is state Rep. Timothy Grendell.

The judge's husband was elected to his wife's seat in the Ohio House of Representatives in 2000. Diane Grendell could not seek re-election because of term limits.

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"He and his wife found a creative way around Ohio's legislative term limits," wrote Ohio Attorney General Nancy Rogers.

In addition, Timothy Grendell became the "champion" of the plaintiffs by helping lead the Ohio Lakefront Group's efforts, Rogers said.

"Judge Grendell's spouse has an economic interest in the subject matter in controversy ... requiring Judge Grendell's disqualification," the affidavit states. "A reasonable and impartial observer could harbor serious doubts about Judge Grendell's appearance of impartiality given her spouse's economic and political relationship with (the) plaintiffs."

The judge said she has no conflict of interest.

"I have absolutely no interest in the outcome of the case," she said. "It would be wrong -- and a dangerous precedent -- that judges be bound by comments made by their husbands."

The representative declined comment other than to say, "I stay out of my wife's judicial activities."

The Attorney General's Office, along with the National Wildlife Federation, Ohio Environmental Council and the League of Ohio Sportsmen, are hoping to reverse a December ruling by Lake County Common Pleas Judge Eugene A. Lucci, whose decision stated people could still walk along beaches as long as they keep their feet wet.

Lucci ruled ODNR overstepped its authority by charging rent and leasing beach to landowners between the high water mark and the lake.

Thousands of property owners sued ODNR in 2004 to affirm their rights, claiming their property line is at the low-water mark of the lake.

ODNR argued the boundary is at the high-water mark and forced some property owners to lease land on the lakefront based on that policy.

Lucci found both sides wrong on that matter, ruling that the private-public ownership line is really at the water's edge, or the shoreline. Oral arguments on the appeals are scheduled for Tuesday.